


AND OUR HEARTBEATS

by curvatures



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:54:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26575606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/curvatures/pseuds/curvatures
Summary: Yuuri does not remember the banquet, but Victor does. (A story in 10 parts.)
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Comments: 6
Kudos: 24





	AND OUR HEARTBEATS

**Author's Note:**

> THIS IS A BIRTHDAY GIFT FOR THE LOVELY BRINA (@SHACHISHOYO ON TWIT), who i love dearly and who loves victuuri dearly! funnily enough, i ALSO love victuuri and was more than happy to write about them once spurred into action. Hope you enjoy this luv <3

** _i. i woke up this morning and found the bed still warm_ **

Yuuri wakes flat on his stomach with his head buried in between their two pillows, one arm stretched to the currently vacant other side of the bed. Breathing in deep, he presses his face into the sheets and then turns onto his side, blinking into the dim room. A slice of light from outside pokes through the ends of the blinds, casting the furniture and floor in muted shades of amber. Faintly, he realizes he can smell coffee, and shortly after this thought occurs Victor steps in, holding two steaming mugs.

“Good morning,” he says, smiling, and Yuuri can’t help but reciprocate the expression. Victor sits down on the bed and extends a cup to his lover.

** _ii. then we stuck our palms together and melded into something more_**

“Yuuri,” Victor manages to stutter out between laughs. “ _Yuuri,_ please, stop,”

The man in question only smiles, a small thing with teeth pressing into the dip of Victor’s collarbone. He does not respond. 

** _iii. names feel like sacred things, most days_ **

Yuuri had held his own misconceptions of Victor at some point, but it’s kind of hard to continue to see the Victor he knows now in the same light as teenage Yuuri, who was also drawn into the idea of this fairy-wing-thin creature which storms the ice and leaves kisses behind afterwards. Victor, as he comes to find, is no work of woodland magic, nothing spun saccharine and soft for consumption. Victor is at his family’s hot springs. Victor is having dinner in his childhood home. Victor is banging on his door, is hungover, is whining about how his room doesn’t have enough space for the gorgeous chaise lounge he had delivered. Victor is saying his name a hundred times, a thousand times, a litany of heartfelt declarations. _Yuuri._ Like a prayer, already answered. 

** _iv. i am still learning, still understanding what it means to touch all the parts of me_ **

And Victor finds that Yuuri continues to surprise him, even when there is nothing else to learn about this wonderful man. Victor turned himself into a sugar plum fairy at the age of 16, something softer than cotton candy but sharper than a knife in the right places, and has been struggling to feel like anything solid ever since. Since when did being the very best of anything magical become such a burden? Yuuri slams into him at the banquet— drunk and overheated— and all of the sudden his feet are touching ground for the first time in years. Not a homecoming, or a plane crash, but more like being roused by your ringing alarm and realizing you actually got enough sleep last night. _Oh, hello again. I’m awake now. I wonder what today has in store._ Every morning; what a concept, to be loved unconditionally. What a theory. What a practice. Yuuri will keep waking up beside him until it is no longer a shock to be _truly_ wanted, until he does not need to be a tooth rotting myth to be adored. 

** _v. my dreams, you say?_ **

Yuuri gets _very_ drunk at the banquet. He doesn’t remember the next day, but now his hands know the curve of Victor’s back. The arch of his leg. The thumping gallop of his heart, quietly pulsing loneliness into the air between fingertips. Yuuri forgets, but Victor will remember— remember the hot press of these hands into his dress shirt— and that will make all the difference. Victor flies more than a thousand miles (give or take, he’s not too concerned on the details) because he does not remember the last time he had a home; he just knows that at one point it was the feeling of his feet in his skates, and now he is not sure he can draw the line on where that becomes yet another performance, another magic trick to make the crowd _ooh_ and _ahh._ Yuuri is so achingly human, the way he’s too sweaty, how he’s steadily and mysteriously been losing clothes all night; Victor falls deep into the core of him, this man who came in last and has only known tears until he was too deep into the high quality banquet champagne to swim out.

_Be my coach, Victor!_ Yuuri will forget this, but Victor will not.

** _vi. now that the fire has been lit_ **

Yuuri is not the greatest at saying how he feels; he gets shy, he gets anxious, and most often he gets frustrated or flustered trying to voice his thoughts and feelings. It’s not often that he has felt at one with his body, given how his mind runs away and the rest of his being tends to follow. It is all too easy to recede into himself, and yet he finds that with Eros, it is as simple as breathing; an assumption which becomes reality. _Here is my body._ Here is my body, telling you what we already know. I have given myself to you before, and now it is your turn to surrender. I know

you are mine. 

** _vii. i want very much, and i want it soon._ **

Yuuri might have dropped his medal in his rush to embrace Victor after the final, but at least Victor is here to pick it up for him, to add to his request. _Stay in competitive skating with me, but don’t put a limit on it; let’s keep going, and going, and going. I am at a loss without you._ Leaving the arena is a quiet, hungry affair; silver, but with a promise of gold to match the bands on their fingers.

Later, Yuuri will pull away from a deep kiss with a soft noise and say— eyes wide and serious— _but_ I am _going to win gold. I hope you know who you want to invite to the wedding._ And Victor is not prepared, was not prepared at any point in time ever, has not been the same since the night Yuuri laid all his greatest dance moves and ambitions upon him. Since Yuuri laid his palms upon him. Yuuri slides a warm hand up under his shirt, and Victor shudders. In this moment, he cannot possibly think of anyone to invite to the wedding; he just knows that this man will be there, and that is what he wants.

And he wants. 

** _viii. be aware of the quiet noise my beating heart and full lungs make_ **

_“He actually hates losing,”_ Yuuko had said. _"Aside from skating, he's never been good at putting himself out there."_ Yuuri wants to win, but most days he worries this is asking for too much. He has been trying to let Victor go, because he assumes he is better off without him. Victor thinks this is absolute _bullshit,_ and _why would you do this to me,_ but he's having a hard time putting it in explicit terms. Everything he cannot bring himself to voice, just yet: _I can’t do this without you. You are every sunrise, every morning I’ve ever been waiting for. I thought the curtains had closed but I was wrong, I was so, so wrong. I was just waiting for you._

“How much longer are you going to stay in warmup mode?” asks Victor, a challenge by way of query. Yuuri does his best not to cry (Victor would hate it if he ruined his makeup mere seconds before his performance), and then he beats Victor’s world record. He tells him he would like to continue skating. Victor says _okay,_ _but keep going!_ He thinks, _stay._

He doesn’t have to say much else. This time, Yuuri _actually_ cries, and then he agrees. The next day, when they leave, they leave hand-in-hand. 

** _ix. i am still in love with the boy who left at the end of the night_ **

Victor remembers the banquet. Victor remembers the banquet. On his tiny little phone screen, Yuuri Katsuki does not say a word but his body is singing, is swaying, is coming apart and together again, holding up a mirror to Victor’s face. _Have you maybe been abandoned as well?_

There was no phone call afterwards, no numbers exchanged; just the silhouette of Yuuri on his way out, a lovely face dissolving in the crowd. Victor will have to keep reaching, keep striking forward into the future as he’s always done. There was no communication after the banquet, but he can’t wipe the look on Yuuri’s face from his mind; the hope, the longing. He takes the risk. He closes the distance.

** _x. let’s leave together/i’m ready now_ **

They perform _stammi vicino_ together as it was meant to be; two halves becoming a whole. One unit, glittering in the possibility of tomorrow. _There’s a place you just can’t reach until you have a dream too large to bear alone._ They don’t have to do it on their own, anymore. Now, there is only all the living left to do from here on out. Victor raises a hand, says his name like always; a love letter, a homecoming, a fervent sonnet.

Yuuri rushes forth to meet him. 

**Author's Note:**

> all of the section titles are from my personal journal (some of which were modified to better fit this fic), except for the very last one, which is from the english translation i found on the fandom wiki of "stammi vicino". Same thing with the title, which was also taken from the same translation. find me on twit [@daichiscasket](https://twitter.com/daichiscasket) !


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